Shinto

866. A fire having destroyed one of the gates of the Palace, the diviners said that it portended sickness to the Imperial person with disasters by conflagration and battle. After some delay, caused by various pollutions, the Mikado sent an envoy to the shrine of the Sun-Goddess at Ise with prayer to avert these calamities, and more especially to send down a sweet rain on the land which was then suffering from drought.

868. Envoys were sent to Hirota and Ikuta praying the Gods of these places that earthquake shocks attributed to them should cease. A patent of rank was sent to them, and they were besought to bless the Mikado and the country. Thanks were also given for a good harvest.

874. Inari was raised in rank and prayed to for many blessings, of which some do not apparently belong to the province of a Rice-God.

For an account of Shinto festivals at the present day, Mr. B. H. Chamberlain's 'Things Japanese' or Capt. Brinkley's 'Japan and China' may be consulted. Their nearest counterpart is the carnival of Southern Europe. The Chinjiu Matsuri, or annual festival of the local patron deity, is everywhere a great event, with processions, dramatic performances, wrestling, fireworks, races, new clothes for the children, &c.

CHAPTER XIII.

MAGIC, DIVINATION, INSPIRATION

The reader will find few traces of normal religious development in the practices to be described in this chapter. The pathological element is decidedly predominant.

Magic. – The older view of magic is that of Prof. Zimmern, who defines it as "the attempt on man's part to influence, persuade, or compel spiritual beings to comply with certain requests or demands." With this the view of the modern Japanese lexicographer Yamada, who calls magic (in Japanese majinahi) "the keeping off of calamity by the aid of the supernatural power of Kami and Buddhas," is in substantial agreement. Prof. Zimmern's definition is open to several objections. It is too wide, as it would include prayer and sacrifice; it assumes that all the sentient beings appealed to are spiritual, and it excludes the numerous cases of magic in which Gods and spirits are in no wise concerned. It is, however, impossible to leave out of consideration the last-mentioned class of magic, though it might be convenient to distinguish it by a different name, as "charms." Sir Alfred Lyall and Mr. J. G. Frazer have shown that magic of this kind has preceded religion, and that it is in principle the same as science, although based on wrong premises.

Magic and Medicine. – Magic is the bastard brother of medicine. The two arts are associated in many countries. Hirata says that in China medicine had its origin in magic. In Japan, in Kōtoku's reign (645-654), we find State departments of medicine and of magic organized on a similar footing. A Nihongi myth states that mankind owes both arts to the teaching of the Gods Ohonamochi and Sukunabikona. Evidently the myth by which these institutions are referred to a divine origin is of later growth than the institutions themselves. The same is plainly the case with the deification of the phallic emblems used to repel disease,[288 - See above, p. 197. (#Page_197)] and with the various magical appliances described on p. 196 (#FNanchor_165_165). The object of the myth-maker in these cases was to lend a religious sanction to what was in its origin a non-religious magical procedure. The same principle might be copiously illustrated from non-Japanese sources. On the other hand, there are cases in which a practice based on religion has its original character obliterated, so that it might easily be mistaken for a charm of no religious import.

Bakin on Magic. – I have before me a collection of "vulgar magical practices" (majinahi) made early in the last century by the famous novelist Bakin.[289 - 'Yenzeki Zasshi,' v. 1.] It illustrates the confusion, even with highly educated men, between science and magic on the one hand, and between non-religious and religious magic on the other. A good many of Bakin's so-called majinahi turn out to be merely recipes, such as how to remove oil stains from books by an application of lime; to cure costiveness in fowls by doses of saltpetre; to kill the parasites of gold-fish by means of a preparation of human excrement; to keep away bookworms by exposing the books in the sun: "If a pot-tree withers in the middle and seems likely to die, take it out, shake the earth from its roots, and expose it to the sun for one day. Then steep its roots in a drain for one night. When replanted it will thrive." The scrapings of a copper ladle mixed with fish will cure disease in cats. We approach true magic more nearly in the following: "When stung by a wasp, take up a pebble which is half sunk in the ground, turn it over, and replace it, when the pain will at once leave you." The cure of illness from eating poisonous fish by swallowing the ashes of an old almanac seems also to belong rather to magic than to medicine. There are traces of a religious element in the following: "To cure toothache, apply to the tooth the ashes of a sardine which has been set up over the door on the last day of the year."[290 - When demons and evil influences are expelled. See above, p. 308. (#Page_308)] Another plan is: "Inscribe on a slip of wood certain incantations (given) in the ordinary Chinese character, in the seal character, and in Sanskrit. Beside the inscription make two circles. If the toothache is in the upper jaw, knock a new nail with a purified hammer into the upper circle; if in the lower jaw, into the lower circle. If the pain does not go away, continue knocking the nail with the hammer. The slip of wood should be afterwards thrown away into a stream."[291 - After the manner of the Oho-harahi offerings.] Bakin tried this plan and found it effectual. He attributes his immunity from conflagration to his respect for fire. He always avoided stamping it out with his foot, and enjoins on his descendants to follow his example. If the master of a house before going to bed goes round calling out, "Be careful of fire: fasten well the doors," the spirit (of his words) will fill the house, and it will be preserved against fire and robbery. On the last night of the year, and on other festival occasions, water should be drawn from the well at sunset, placed in a clean vessel, and offered without a drop being spilled to the God of the kitchen furnace. It should be returned to the well the next morning. This will prevent danger of fire.

A Korean book of household recipes contains, along with instructions for making cakes, spiced wine, &c., such magical, but non-religious devices as the following: "To make a runaway slave come back of his own accord. Take a garment which he has worn and put it down the well, or hang some of his hair on a wheel and turn it round. He will then not know where to go and will come back to you."

Imitative or Sympathetic Magic. – These Korean examples illustrate the principle of imitative or sympathetic magic thus described by Mr. J. G. Frazer[292 - 'The Golden Bough,' second edition, p. 9.]: -

"Manifold as are the applications of this crude philosophy-for a philosophy it is as well as an art-the fundamental principles on which it is based would seem to be reducible to two; first, that like produces like, or that an effect resembles its cause; and second, that things which have once been in contact, but have ceased to be so, continue to act on each other as if the contact still persisted. From the first of these principles the savage infers that he can produce any desired effect merely by imitating it; from the second he concludes that he can influence at pleasure and at any distance any person of whom, or anything of which, he possesses a particle. Magic of the latter sort, resting as it does on the belief in a certain secret sympathy which unites indissolubly things that have once been connected with each other, may appropriately be termed sympathetic in the strict sense of the term. Magic of the former kind, in which the supposed cause resembles or simulates the supposed effect, may conveniently be described as imitative or mimetic."

The sympathetic or imitative principle is not very conspicuous in the instances of vulgar (that is, non-professional) magic quoted by Bakin. It is, however, illustrated by other Japanese customs. There is a round stone in a shrine in Sagami which brings rain when water is poured over it. The stone is supposed to be the shintai of an Aburi no Kami (rain-fall-God), to whom the shrine is dedicated. Here we have a combination of religion with magic.[293 - I cannot offer any explanation of the magic used by women and children in order to bring fine weather. They hang upside down to the eaves or on the branch of a tree human figures cut in paper, and called Teri-teri-bōzu (shine-shine-priest).] Whistling in order to raise the wind[294 - See above, p. 115. (#Page_115)] is a purely non-religious piece of imitative magic, but in the Nihongi myth it is associated with religion by being represented as taught by a God. We should probably regard as a form of sympathetic magic the modern practice of devout visitors to the shrine of Tenjin, near Kiôto, who, in order to obtain relief from their ailments, rub the corresponding part of a bronze bull which stands before the shrine. A characteristic example of non-religious imitative magic is the custom of kasedori. When a marriage is unfruitful, the old women of the neighbourhood come to the house and go through the form of delivering the wife of a child. The infant is represented by a doll. The date selected for this ceremony is not immaterial. It is that of the festival of Sahe no kami. This, no doubt, gives it a quasi-religious flavour. To this class we may also refer the New Year's practice of going to sleep with a picture of a boat under the pillow. If lucky dreams follow an anchor is painted to it, if unlucky dreams a sail.

The Nihongi[295 - I. 157.] records a case in which a woman took earth from Mount Kako in Yamato, which she wrapped in her neckerchief and prayed, saying: "'This earth represents the country of Yamato.' Then she turned it upside down." The common witchcraft of ill-treating a figure of the intended victim in order to make him suffer in a corresponding manner is well known in Japan. The Nihongi (a. d. 587) speaks of a rebellious Minister preparing figures of the Heir to the Throne and loathing them. Dr. Griffis[296 - 'The Mikado's Empire,' p. 474.] gives the following description of a magical ceremony performed by a woman in revenge for her lover's desertion of her: -

"At two o'clock in the morning she proceeds to the shrine of her patron-God, usually the Ujigami. Sometimes she wears a crown, made of an iron tripod reversed, on which burn three candles. In her left hand she carries a straw effigy of her victim; in her right she grasps a hammer. On her bosom is suspended a mirror. Reaching the sacred tree before the shrine, she impales the effigy upon it with nails, adjuring the Gods to save their tree, impute the guilt of desecration to the traitor, and visit him with their deadly vengeance. The visit is repeated nightly until the object of her sorcery sickens and dies. At Sabae, before a shrine of Kompira, stood a pine tree about a foot thick, plentifully studded with such nails."[297 - See also Ch. K. 263.]

The possession by the operator of the hair or nails of his victim adds greatly to the potency of his devices. Hence they are carefully kept by the proper owners and thrown away together in the twelfth month.

Another form of witchcraft is represented by the later custom of Inu-gami (dog-deity) thus described by Motoöri: "A hungry dog is tied up in sight of food which he is not allowed to eat. When his desire is keenest, his head is cut off and at once flies to seize the food. This head is put into a vessel and worshipped. A serpent or a weasel will do as well." It constitutes a mighty charm, which evidently owes its power to the keenness of the animal's sufferings.[298 - According to Van Helmont, the reason why bull's fat is so powerful in a vulnerary ointment is that the bull at the time of slaughter is full of secret reluctancy and vindictive murmurs, and therefore dies with a higher flame of revenge about him than any other animal.] The Fūzoku Gwaho tells a story which was probably invented in order to account for this custom. "An old woman buried her pet dog, leaving only the head above ground. Then she cut him about with a bamboo saw, saying, 'If thou hast a soul, kill such a one, and I will make thee a God.' The man really did die afterwards in strange fashion. From that time the dog-deity dwelt in the old woman's house and wrought many wonderful curses." In Tosa each village has several Inugami-mochi (dog-deity-owners). They are shunned by their neighbours. A matchmaker's very first inquiry is whether there is such a person in the family. Leprosy is the next subject of his questions, sudden death (supposed to be hereditary), riches or poverty, wisdom or foolishness, are of subsidiary importance.

The same idea of a materialized emotion is illustrated by a practice common near Yamaguchi. In order to drive away certain destructive insects from the rice-fields a straw figure, made to resemble a cavalry soldier, is led round in stately procession, and finally flung into the sea. This figure represents the leader of some fugitives from a battle who hid in these fields, but were pursued and slain there. The noxious insects are their materialized resentment at this fate.

The principles of sympathetic and imitative magic, so copiously illustrated in 'The Golden Bough,' are not applicable to all magical procedures. Many defy specific explanation, and are possibly the result of some chance association of ideas no longer traceable, or of a mistaken empiricism. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc is responsible for much that is called magic.

The description of magic in Hastings's 'Dictionary of the Bible' as a "means of binding superhuman powers, either to restrain them from injuring oneself, or to constrain them to injure others and put them under a spell, or to reveal what to mortal man was unknown," scarcely applies at all to Japanese magic. I have not met with any mention in the older literature of pacts with demons or the coercion of spirits.

The Symbol in Magic. – In Japan, as in other countries, magic makes great use of the Symbol, the Talisman, and the Formula, spoken or written. This seems to depend on the more general notion that things which are associated in thought must have also a direct physical influence on each other, of which a familiar example among ourselves is the objection to receive a knife as a present, because it might cut the friendship between the giver and receiver. Possibly this association of the subjective with the objective (in Dr. Tylor's words "mistaking an ideal for a real connexion)[299 - See 'Primitive Culture,' i. 116, where numerous examples of symbolic magic are given.] was in Hirata's mind when he used the somewhat cryptic phrase, "Magic (majinahi, or magic, means etymologically mixture) is so called because it mixes the spirit (tama) of that which is here with the body of that which is there." We have seen[300 - See above, p. 187. (#Page_187)] that the phallus, as a symbol of robust animal life, was used to exorcise evil things, whether demons or diseases. Roof-tiles impressed with a symbol (bubbles) which is indicative of water, are used at the present day as a charm to protect houses from fire. The deification of the gourd, the clay and the water-plant, no doubt, points to a previous magical use as preventives of conflagration. Rice, perhaps as a representative of the kteis, is used for several magical purposes. In one of the Fudoki, unhulled rice is scattered broadcast by Tsuchigumo,[301 - The Tsuchigumo (earth-hiders) were men of a low class, who lived in dwellings sunk in the earth, and gave much trouble to the Japanese Government in ancient times. Dr. Tylor, in his 'Primitive Culture,' i. 113, has noted the tendency to attribute magical powers to pariahs and foreigners. Sukunabikona, the teacher of magic to Japan, came from abroad.] to disperse a strange darkness which turned day into night.

The Talisman. – When the meaning of the symbol is altogether obliterated or unknown, we have the Talisman. It is not clear what was meant by the "tide-ebbing" and "tide-flowing" jewels given by the Sea-God to Hohodemi,[302 - See above, p. 115. (#Page_115)] or even that they had any meaning at all. A sort of scarf (hire) was much used as a talisman. In the Kojiki we are told of a scarf, which, when waved thrice, quieted snakes. Another kind gave protection against wasps and centipedes.[303 - See above, p. 106. (#Page_106)] The Nihongi has the following account of magical practices, suggested apparently by some acquaintance with the art of acupuncture: —

"Summer, 4th month, 1st day. The Koryö student-priests said that their fellow-student Kura-tsukuri no Tokushi had made friends with a tiger, and had learnt from him his arts, such as to make a barren mountain change into a green mountain, or to cause yellow earth to become clear water, and all manner of wonderful arts too many to enumerate. Moreover, the tiger bestowed on him his needle, saying: 'Be watchful! be watchful, and let no one know! Treated with this, there is no disease which may not be cured.' Truly, as the tiger had said, there was no disease which was not cured when treated by it. Tokushi always kept the needle concealed in a pillar. Afterwards the tiger broke the pillar and ran away, taking the needle with him."

Shaking or jingling talismans or other objects is supposed to have a magical virtue. Izanagi shakes the jewels which he takes from his neck to bestow on the Sun-Goddess. The Sun-Goddess and Susa no wo shook the jewels from which their children were produced. Shaking a number of talismans was part of the ceremony of Mitama furishiki, above described.[304 - See p. 292. (#Page_292)]

Part of the outfit of a district wise-woman or sorceress in recent times was a small bow, called adzusa-yumi, by twanging which she could call from the vasty deep the spirits of the dead, or even summon deities to her behests. Another small bow, called ha-ma-yumi (break-demon-bow) is given to boys at the New Year. I conjecture that both of these had something to do with the bows used in the ceremony of tsuina described above.

Another magical appliance for the restraint of demoniac or evil influences is the shime-naha, or close-rope. It is made of rice-straw plucked up by the roots, the ends being allowed to dangle down at regular intervals. A rope of this kind was used to prevent the Sun-Goddess from returning into the Rock-cave of Heaven. At the present day it is hung in front of shrines, and at the New Year before ordinary dwellings. Sacred trees are girt with it, or it may be suspended across a road to prevent the passage of evil spirits. Some people wear shime-naha on their person. The twin rocks at Ise, between which there is a view of Fuji and the rising sun, are connected by an immense shime-naha, with which a legend is associated to the effect that Susa no wo, in return for hospitality, taught his host how to keep out the God of Pestilence by stretching such a rope across the door. The shime-naha is sometimes called Hi no mi tsuna (sun-august-rope). The shime-naha is the counterpart of the consecrated rope which in Siam is fastened on the last day of the year round the city walls to prevent the banished demons from returning.

Garlic has the same power over evil spirits in Japan that it has in Europe.

The Formula in Magic. – The magic power of set forms of speech, quite distinct from any meaning which they may possess, is well illustrated by the use of the numerals from one to ten as a magic formula for the cure of disease. But in the instructions of the Sea-God to Hohodemi to return the lost fish-hook to his brother with the words, "A hook of poverty, a hook of ruin, a hook of downfall," the proper meaning of the words is retained, though they are evidently supposed to be accompanied by some mysterious potency, independent of it. Beyond the circumstance that they were taught by Gods, these incantations do not seem to have had any religious character. Nor, when a judge[305 - Nihongi, ii. 82.] is about to execute some criminals by casting them into the fire, and uses the charm, "Not by my hands are they cast," is there apparently any God invoked. The words themselves avert any evil result. There is no hint of a religious origin in the passage of the Nihongi which states that the first Mikado, Jimmu, invented magical formulæ for the dissipation of evil influences. Of course, there are many formulæ of this kind which stand on a different footing. When, at the present day, a Japanese calls out Kuhabara!Kuhabara! (mulberry-grove) during a thunderstorm, it is no doubt with the idea of suggesting to the Thunder-God that the place is a mulberry grove, which, it is believed, is never struck by lightning. Charms often consist of a ticket with the name of the God (usually the ubusuna) and a statement that the bearer is under his protection.

Magic and Shinto. – The treatment of magic by Shinto is not uniform. We have seen that it lends its sanction to some practices of this kind by affirming that they were taught or practised by Gods, or by deifying the objects used in them. But there are others which it condemns, including them in the offences against the Gods enumerated in the Oho-harahi.[306 - See above, p. 294. (#Page_206)] It is, however, for their malicious purpose that they are reprobated. There is no trace in the old records of any scepticism as to their efficacy. A scientific knowledge sufficient to arouse doubts of the power of magic did not then exist, and would have been equally fatal to much in Shinto itself. Even in modern times such highly educated men as Bakin and Hirata had an implicit belief in the efficacy of this art. The latter complains that there is a tendency among physicians of the Chinese school to neglect it. Some diseases, he says, are caused by evil spirits and some by minute insects (microbes?). Magic and medicine should therefore, in his opinion, be combined.

The decay of magic in modern Japan is not owing to religious but to scientific progress. It is due to China, whose philosophy, imperfect as it is, taught far truer views of the limitations of man's powers than anything Japan was able to discover for herself.

Divination. – Divination (in Japanese uranahi) is magic which has a special object, namely, the revelation of the unknown. This is implied by the Japanese word, which is derived from ura, the rear, heart, lining, obverse, and hence that which is concealed. Ordinary experience, and, at a later stage of progress, science, enable us to reason with more or less certainty from the known to the unknown; but mankind, not satisfied with legitimate methods, have supplemented them by divination, which comprises various irregular and ineffective processes specially directed to discovering the will of the Gods, ascertaining what will be lucky or unlucky, and predicting future events.

Objects of Divination. – In Japan we find divination practised to ascertain whether an expedition would be successful or unsuccessful, the reason of the disturbed state of the country and its remedy, the best site for a temple, tomb, or dwelling-house, whether the Mikado should make a progress to a certain place and perform sacrifices there, what crops it is best to sow, what days will be lucky or unlucky, when to expect a lover, the name of a future husband, &c. The priestess of Ise was selected by divination, and the provinces from which the rice for the Ohonihe ceremony should be taken. Ominous occurrences were interpreted by the help of this art. The purity of persons about to take part in a religious ceremony was tested in this manner. Or divination might be applied to the baser use of recovering lost property or discovering thieves. There was a special divination on the 10th day of the 12th month to ascertain what ill luck threatened the Mikado during the ensuing six months, so that the Gods whose curse was feared might be propitiated in advance.

Religious and Non-religious Divination. – Divination, like magic, does not necessarily involve the intervention of superhuman sentient beings, as we may see by our own palmistry, fortune-telling by cards, and Shakespeare cryptograms. That the art passed through a non-religious phase is highly probable. In Japan, however, the cases met with in the oldest records are commonly associated, explicitly or implicitly, with an appeal for divine guidance. Hirata defines divination as "respectfully inquiring the heart (ura) of the Gods." Motoöri takes the same view, though both writers admit that in modern times divination which has no religious sanction is sometimes resorted to, playfully, or in unimportant matters.

The Greater Divination. – The greater, or official, divination consists in drawing conclusions according to certain conventional rules from the cracks which appear in a deer's shoulder-blade when exposed to fire. This practice is known not only to the Chinese, Kalmucks, Cherkeses, and other races of North-Eastern Asia, but to the ancient Germans and Greeks. Nearer home we have the "reading the speal" (épaule), a sort of divination by examining the marks on a shoulder-blade of mutton, practised not very long ago in the Highlands of Scotland. The Nihongi tells us that the Gods themselves made use of the Greater Divination in order to learn the reason of Izanagi and Izanami's abortive children the Hiruko and the Island of Ahaji. The God Koyane, ancestor of the Nakatomi, was specially charged with this form of divination. In the numerous passages of the Nihongi where divination is mentioned without further description, it is no doubt the Greater Divination which is intended. Chinese methods of divination were introduced into Japan from Korea at an early date. In 553 it seems to have been an established practice that Koreans learned in medicine, in divination, and in calendar-making should take turns of service at the Court of Japan. It was no doubt owing to their influence that the tortoise-shell was substituted for the deer's shoulder-blade in this divination. A reference to the "divine Tortoise" in the Nihongi under the legendary date b. c.92 is merely an anachronism. But the tortoise was really in use for this purpose in the eighth century. The Yengishiki recognizes no other, though in the country districts the shoulder-blades of deer were long retained.

In an old book purporting to describe the practice of the Tsushima college of diviners at a much later period than the Yengishiki, we are told that the diviner, after practising religious abstinence for seven days, took his place in the divination plot (uraba or uraniha), from which all other persons were rigorously excluded. He was provided with the tortoise-shell, some hahaka wood, and other requisites. Having prayed to the God of the divination plot,[307 - Koyane. Hirata speaks with scorn of the Chinese methods of divining current in Japan in later times, in which no invocation of the Gods was used. Sometimes other Gods, and even Buddhas, were invoked.] who is besought to grant a true divination, the diviner recites the Kami-oroshi (formula which brings down the God), and kindles in a blazing fire a stick of hahaka about four or five inches long, and of the thickness of a chopstick. When it has taken fire, he blows it out, and with it pricks the tortoise-shell from the back. Divination is then made from the lines thus produced. When the divination is over, the Kami-agari (ascent of the God) is recited, and the ceremony is at an end.

The Shintō Miōmoku Ruijiu gives the following description of a form of tortoise-shell divination practised at Kashima to select young girls for the service of the God (mono-imi). Two candidates who have not reached puberty perform rites to the God for 100 days. On the final day a caldron is set up before the shrine and two tortoise-shells are placed in it, each of which bears the name of one of the girls. These are roasted from early morning till dusk. The tortoise-shell with the name of the successful candidate is then found to be wholly uninjured by the fire whilst the other is reduced to ashes. It is said that the girl selected attains a great age and that she never menstruates.

Tsuji-ura (cross-roads divination).[308 - "The King of Babylon stood at the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways, to perform divination." – Ezekiel xxi. 21.] – This form of divination was much practised in ancient Japan, especially by women and lovers. It consisted in going out to the road at dusk, planting a stick in the ground to represent Kunado, the phallic God of roads, and interpreting the fragmentary talk of passers-by as an answer to the question.[309 - Pausanias says that in ancient Greece the inquirer, after asking his question of the God and making his offering, took as the divine answer the first words he might hear on quitting the sanctuary.] Another account says that to perform tsuji-ura you take a box-wood comb in your hand, go to cross-roads and sound it three times by drawing your finger along it (tsuge, "box-wood," also means "inform me"). Then, with devotion to the Sahe no Kami, repeat this verse three times: "Oh, thou God of the cross-roads-divination, grant me a true response." Good or bad luck is to be inferred from the words of the next (or the third) person who makes his appearance. Sometimes a boundary line was marked out and rice sprinkled to keep away evil influences. The words of the passer-by who first entered the charmed limit constituted the response.

Hashi-ura (bridge-divination). Little is known of this kind of divination. The procedure was the same as in tsuji-ura, and the Gods concerned were probably the Sahe no Kami. The end-post of a bridge was, and still is, a wo-bashira, that is, male pillar or phallus.

Ishi-ura, or stone-divination, is mentioned in the Manyōshiu along with tsuji-ura. The "stone" is probably the stone emblem of Kunado or Sahe no Kami. It consisted in judging of future fortune by the apparent weight of the stone when lifted. Such stones were called Ishi-gami (stone-deities) and were no doubt phallic.

Mikayu-ura (divination by gruel). This kind of divination is also associated with the Sahe no Kami. It was practised in various forms at Kirawoka in Kahachi, Suha in Shinano, and other places, on the 15th day of the 1st month[310 - The date of the festival of the Sahe no Kami.] in order to ascertain what crops it would be best to sow that year. A pot was set up before the God in which adzuki beans[311 - See above, p. 193. (#Page_193)] were boiled. Then tubes of reed, five or six inches long, marked with the names of all manner of crops were plunged into the gruel. The negi (priests) stood by, and taking out the tubes with chopsticks divined from the manner in which the grains of rice (mixed with the gruel) entered them whether the crop in question would be good or bad. At Haruna the priests published the results to the peasants in a printed form.

Hirata mentions another form of divination in which beans are set in a row round the hearth and fire brought close to them. Some are roasted black while others remain white, and from this the weather and luck of the ensuing year are divined.

Koto-ura (harp-divination) was formerly (11th century) practised at Ise with the object of ascertaining whether the priests who were to take part in the three great religious services of the year and the utensils employed were pure or not. Prayer having been made to the Sun-Goddess, the officiating priest struck a harp three times,[312 - The Kami-yori-ita (God-resort-board), struck in later times to bring down the Gods, is believed to be a substitute for this harp.] uttering with each note a loud Hush! He then recited the following Kami-oroshi (bringing-down the Gods): -

"Ah! we protest that we are in earnest,
To your pure seat deign to descend
All ye Gods of Heaven and Earth,

Ah! we protest that we are in earnest,
To thy pure seat deign to descend
Thou Thunder-God also.

Ah! we protest that we are in earnest,
To your pure seat deign to descend
Oh thou upper great brother and thou lower great brother."[313 - It is not known who these Gods were.]

The names of the priests were then called over and the question asked in the case of each, "Is he clean or unclean?" The officiating priest then struck the harp and tried to whistle by drawing in his breath. If the whistle was audible it was a sign of purity, and vice versâ. The same procedure was observed with regard to the persons who had prepared the offerings, the offerings themselves, and the utensils required in the service.